As you may (or may not) know, this past Tuesday was voting day for a large number of cities and towns across the United States. As a relatively recent resident of Boston and person of voting-age, I had only ever voted once before this year and had little experience in political involvement. However, my interest in politics has grown significantly in the past year, and when the opportunity presented itself, I jumped at the chance to volunteer for the reelection campaign of City Councilwoman Michelle Wu!
Continue reading for seven discoveries I learned through my experience spending four hours talking with South End voters on Election Day 2015!
1. Voters are generally very friendly and willing to talk. Most were already in favor of the candidate I was campaigning for, and many responded to my attempts to engage them with reassurances that they were already giving her a vote. A favorite interaction of mine from the day included a woman who remarked, “You’re working for Michelle? That’s nice!!” as she gave me two thumbs up!
2. Voters who come out on off, off election days are typically those who care very deeply for the community they live in. At one point, I met an older gentleman who remarked to me, “She’s the girl from the South End? I’ve lived here all my life! 87 years in this neighborhood!” He went on to say he really liked Michelle and was excited to vote for her.
3. People are very generous about not wasting flyers. Many voters who I tried to engage with reassured me that they were already voting for Michelle, and so declined a flier so as to save paper. This surprised me, as the fliers would be worthless after election day anyways, but I always appreciated it.
4. People were happy to share with me when they did vote for Michelle. One couple walked out of the voting station exclaiming, “She won! All it took was us!”
5. Part of the job was learning not to take rejection personally. A few people were not the most gracious in declining my offer of a flier, and that was just fine!
6. The typical voter was in the 55-75 demographic, and I saw maybe three people in their thirties or younger throughout the whole day. Most people I saw were much older than this, and even though it was an election with no state or federal candidates on the ballot this still surprised me; City Council can have a huge direct effect on college students and young people, so why didn’t they turn out? When I left my voter station at 5pm, only about 300 people had voted at this particular station.
7. Older people love to see young people getting involved in local politics. It was fun to be out there not only representing Michelle Wu and her team, but representing my age group as well. It meant a lot to folks to see a young person believing in Michelle, and for me this was the best takeaway of the day!